FESTIVAL GOOD IDEA

Seems to me that it’s belaboring the obvious to dwell on the denial of public access to Congress Street during the Festival of Cultural Diversity (see "CCE Schedules Meeting to Clear Air," Sept. 2, by Sara Donnelly). The event planners were clearly mistaken and the same scenario cannot and presumably will not be repeated.

What does need to be looked at, I think, is the general approach to celebrating cultural diversity. In recent years, the area has experienced a significant influx of people representing a rich variety of cultures from all over the world, and anything that will further the understanding between those people and their new neighbors cannot be anything but good. It is also true, though, that there is and has been a great interest on the part of native-born people in celebrating their own cultural heritage. Diversity is the key word here.

The festival should be first and foremost a celebration of all cultures represented in the area. A sharing of conversation, food, music, songs, dancing, poetry, and stories. Neighbors opening up to one another. Try a Somalian dance. Taste Irish stew for the first time. Find a great Mongolian wool hat made by someone up on Brackett Street.

So the Festival should be by and about local people. Not people from far away and high priced. And there shouldn’t be a general admittance fee. A festival should be open to everyone.

With much lower overhead the event might actually be more profitable. The Center for Cultural Diversity could charge participants for spaces and receive a percentage from those participants who offer food or items for sale. The Center might also do such as put together a home-spun publication featuring submissions by people from diverse cultures and offer it for sale throughout the festival. There might also be admittance fees for certain venues. The festival would have the buzz of an international bazaar, with special and alluring attractions off to the side here and there. This Festival of Cultural Diversity is a good one. Let’s keep at it.

Cliff Gallant, Portland

ROWE ABOVE REPROACH

Lance Tapley’s article, "Greens Under Attack?" (Sept. 2) makes many unsubstantiated charges regarding the independence of the Maine Department of the Attorney General, and of Attorney General Stephen Rowe and Assistant Attorney General Leann Robbin. Doing so is a great disservice to the Department and the men and women who work there.

During my tenure as Attorney General, decisions were never made from the perspective of what was in the best interest of any particular political party. Since Stephen Rowe’s election in 2000 as attorney general, I have seen nothing that would indicate that he has changed that. Many of Mr. Tapley’s criticisms simply demonstrate a lack of basic understanding of the investigative and legal process. The "extraordinary move" of having the Department of Attorney General supervise the Biddeford Police investigation is actually good practice. On a case involving a statute such as the one the defendants were prosecuted under, it is critical that the investigation be done in such a way that there is no possibility for error that could provide grounds for having evidence excluded.

The implication that the prosecution was flawed simply because defendants were convicted of misdemeanors rather than felonies likewise shows a basic misunderstanding of the prosecutorial process. It is standard procedure for a defendant to be charged at both a felony and misdemeanor level. This is done from both the perspective of plea agreements, and from the perspective of not tying the hands of juries by only giving them the option of convicting a defendant of the more serious offense.

To sully the reputation of the Department of the Attorney General through the use of such spurious conclusions is grossly unfair.

Andrew Ketterer, Former Maine Attorney General and Former President of National Association of Attorneys General